Ferrari announced on Tuesday that Mattia Binotto is leaving his role as team principal at the Ferrari F1 team, ending weeks of speculation about his future with the Scuderia. Binotto is also leaving Ferrari on Dec. 31, after 28 years with the company.
He originally joined Ferrari in 1995 as a powertrain engineer, working his way up through the ranks and ultimately becoming the head of the F1 team and Gestione Sportiva motorsports department in 2019.
“With the regret that this entails, I have decided to conclude my collaboration with Ferrari,” he said in a statement. “I am leaving a company that I love, which I have been part of for 28 years, with the serenity that comes from the conviction that I have made every effort to achieve the objectives set.”
Binotto took over the team principal role from Maurizio Arrivabene at the start of 2019, after Arrivabene resigned to take up the CEO position at Italian soccer team Juventus. His first years were challenging, but things turned around in 2022 with the arrival of redesigned F1 cars.
Ferrari's cars were among the fastest on the grid, and drivers Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz Jr. dominated the early rounds. However, a combination of unreliability and some severe strategy mishaps later in the season eradicated those early gains and led to Red Bull Racing taking the lead and ultimately winning both the Drivers' and Constructors' titles.
Ferrari is currently in the search for a new F1 team principal and expects to name a successor early in the new year.
